*No, I’m just a spiritual doctor – Alfa
It was like madness had come over 50-year-old Dayo Kamorudeen, a taxi driver in the Lekki area of Lagos, when he heard the most shocking secret his wife of more than 20 years had been keeping from him.
According to Kamorudeen, it appeared that a spell had been placed upon his wife when she told him
on Sunday, January 17 that she was visiting Akute, a border town between Ogun and Lagos states.
Kamorudeen said he lived with his wife and three children in Akute for many years until two years ago when he relocated to his new house in Oke-Ogun area of Ibeju-Lekki, Lagos.
But what happened on January 17 opened a Pandora’s box of a big secret that his wife had been forced to keep for two years.
“My wife told me he was going to Akute that day and she was really adamant as usual. Anytime she said she wanted to go to Akute, there was nothing anybody could say to stop her.
“But this last Sunday, I had to ask her what exactly she was going to do at Akute since we had left the place two years ago. Even if she had a relation there that I did not know about, shouldn’t the person too visit her once in a while?
“She then started crying, mentioning the name of Alfa Shehu Lukman, the Islamic cleric that was teaching my children Qur’anic studies before we left Akute. I remembered that before we left the community, my last daughter suddenly said she was never going to attend the Alfa’s Qur’anic class anymore.
“I asked my wife what the Alfa did and by the time she was done, I was too shocked to even know what to say. I was looking at my wife and she suddenly seemed like a stranger to me, like she was not the same woman I married in 1996. I just could not believe what she was telling me.
“She was crying and said if I did not allow her to visit Alfa, he would kill me and our children and she too would run mad.”
What Kamorudeen narrated that his wife confessed to was too shocking to be believed at first, so our correspondent asked his wife to explain what happened herself.
Kemi told our correspondent that while they were still living at Akute, she had a dream one day. Since her husband was away at work at the time, she said she had to turn to Alfa Shehu Lukman for help.
She said, “The dream was frightening. I narrated the dream to him and he told me that a spirit husband was behind my problem. He said the problem required an urgent solution so that the spirit husband would not be able to kill me.
“He told me that after I had taken my bath the following day, I should call him and he would come with the medicine. The following morning, I took my bath and called him.
“When he came, he brought out a razor and some medicine he had prepared and said he would need to make an incision on my private part. I asked why he couldn’t just explain how it would be done so that my husband could do it for me when he came back from work but he said that it was a taboo for husbands to handle such medicine.
“He told me that to ward off the spirit husband, the incision was just the preliminary treatment. He said the medicine would be rubbed on the incision after it had been made.
“I agreed to it and he was making the incision when he suddenly grabbed my neck and forced himself on me. He raped me on the three-seater couch in our sitting room.”
Kemi explained that after Lukman had his way with her, he brought out some drugs and a Qur’an and told her that if she dared to disclose what he did to anybody, her husband and children would die while she would run mad.
She said as she was visibly shaking in fright, he made her swear to secrecy with the Qur’an.
The 45-year-old artisan told PUNCH, “He told me not to worry and that the spirit husband would leave me alone so far as I heeded his instructions. I asked why he would do such a terrible thing to me when he knew my children and husband.
“He said what was done was done. He said he used a medicine on me while raping me and that he would leave me to my problem if I decided to make a scene. He said I would simply run mad.
“He said another condition that would make me to retain my sanity was that anytime he needed s*x and he called me, I must always heed his call wherever I was and that I must not tell anyone.”
“I have been his s*x slave for the past two years because of this. He calls me anytime he wants s*x. Sometimes he sleeps with me in our house when my husband is away, sometimes he demands that I should come to his house in Akute.”
Asked if Lukman’s wife and children were not usually around when he slept with her, she said he has a dedicated room where he slept with her.
Asked how she did not summon the courage to tell her husband in the last two years, she said she was just too afraid that Lukman might make good his threat.
Kemi said she was also afraid that Lukman could reverse a spiritual help he rendered to her youngest child, who is now 22 years old.
“There was a time my daughter woke up and was complaining of some problems. I took her to the Alfa and he said she needed a spiritual bath. That was before he first forced himself on me. He took her for the spiritual bath and she became well,” she said.
Asked if she followed the spiritualist and her daughter to the spot where the spiritual bath took place, she said Lukman forbade her from following.
Kemi’s husband said he simply could not believe that his wife was going through such a thing without telling anyone.
“I told her that she must not go that day and that if he was indeed as powerful as he claimed to be, he should kill me before the next day,” Kamorudeen said.
Kamorudeen said one of their children, a university undergraduate, was travelling to school and had accident that affected her legs few years ago.
He said, “My last born, who introduced the Alfa (Lukman) to us, was undergoing Qur’anic studies under him at the time. While we were in Ife for her elder sister’s treatment, she was alone at home.
“She said she was sleeping in the sitting room one afternoon when the Alfa came visiting to sympathise with us on the accident. She said when she told him that we were not around, he suddenly grabbed her neck and attempted to r*pe her but she quickly raised the alarm.
“Our landlady at the time came out when she heard the noise but the Alfa quickly told the woman that he was just trying to continue the Qur’anic studies and she was proving stubborn. He used that opportunity to escape that day. My daughter too could not tell the woman what actually happened.”
Kamorudeen said he could recall that since they left Akute two years ago, his wife had visited the place more than 30 times.
On Thursday, our correspondent tracked down Lukman in a remote community of Otun Abule, few kilometres from Akute area of Ogun State where he carries out his spiritual consultations.
Lukman, who started to sweat when our correspondent mentioned Kemi’s name, said he is 52 years old and an indigene of Abeokuta, Ogun State.
When all the allegations against him had been related, he said he was really shocked about everything the woman had said against him.
He said, “There is no quarrel between us, so I don’t know where all these rape allegations are coming from. I am really shocked but truly, they consult with me regularly on spiritual issues.
“I am a spiritual doctor to the woman and her children. It is true that I made incisions on her, but it was not on her private part. It was just beside her private part, on the inner part of her thighs.
“I have been a spiritualist for more than 30 years and I do not lie. It is true that I also did a treatment for her daughter which required a spiritual bath. There is nothing strange in that. There is a stream not far from here where she had the bath.
“I knew the girl first when she was my pupil. She then introduced me to her parents. Her mother consults me all the time and so do the children. But I never slept with or r*ped the woman before. I also never attempted to r*pe her daughter.”
Asked if he ever called Kemi in recent times, he said he only called her about two weeks ago to find out if she was visiting the area.
“She had told me before that she was attending an event around here. So, I called two weeks ago to know about the event,” he said.
And why did he have to do that, he was asked, Lukman said he was just checking on her welfare.
“Before that last call, I had not even spoken with her for about four months.”
Kamorudeen, who reached out to activist, Esther Ogwu, of the Esther Child Rights Foundation, for help, said he wants justice but does not know the appropriate step to take.
The case has yet to be reported to the police, but Ogwu said the authorities would be notified.
She said, “People should be careful the kind of people they turn to for help. At this point, I can only advise people who may be in a similar situation to always confide in a third party.
“I believe Kemi. He probably simply preyed on her fears. It is also possible that this Alfa might be doing the same thing to other people in that community. They should seek help because whatever he is feeding them is just lies to keep them enslaved.”
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